


Family Affairs

by xJordanKayX



Series: Same Faces Different Places [3]
Category: Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-22
Updated: 2018-01-22
Packaged: 2019-03-08 06:02:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,259
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13452036
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/xJordanKayX/pseuds/xJordanKayX
Summary: Alice and Penelope get closer than they should be





	Family Affairs

**Author's Note:**

> World:   
> A Riverdale where the Cooper's and the Blossom's are two rivaling mob families. 
> 
>  
> 
> This is for TheXtremeFangirl, thank you for the idea. I know, this is not exactly what you described, but I still hope this is okay :)
> 
> promt: So, my idea was, I guess you could say a mob AU? Basically Alice and Penelope are having an affair and having to work really hard to hide it because Hal and Clifford are intense rivals, and the girls are kind of afraid of what they'll do if they find out about the affair.

The first time she sees Penelope Blossom is at their daughters' dance recital and Alice Cooper thinks she's a stuck up bitch. The perfectly pinned up hair, the perfectly ironed clothes, the perfectly applied make-up, the perfect husband and the perfect second child. Alice has all of this, too, but there's just something about the other woman that makes Alice believe she thinks she's better than everyone else. 

It's probably true, too. The Blossoms have always been rich and well-known and just generally judging people. Clifford Blossom had inherited the family business from his father, who had in turn gotten it from his own and so on. And when the time comes, it will fall into his son's hands. Officially the Blossom Business deals in Maple Syrup, has for as long back as anyone can remember, but everyone knows that that's just a front for what's really going on. You don't live like the Blossoms do, even with family money that had surely been acquired in the same fashion, by producing and selling Maple Syrup. Not even the self-acclaimed best one on the whole state. And Penelope, who'd come from money, too, had fit perfectly into the family. 

Alice had grown up with a while lot less money and parents working two jobs just to be able to pay rent and put food on the table. She'd had a pretty great childhood, all together, but her parents never wanted her to end up like them. They wanted her to be able to provide for her children. So, when Hal Cooper asked her out on date she had agreed mainly for her mother and father, until she found she really liked him. They had married pretty quickly after that first date, and just a few weeks later, he'd taken over their own family business, that, if she's honest with herself, is just as shady as that of the Blossoms. But it's her family, so that's different. 

She watches her husband steal hidden glances in the general direction Penelope and Clifford are sitting, always disguising it as something else, trying to figure out if this is just a simple outing to watch their daughter preform or if Clifford Blossom is using the opportunity to conduct business. She inconspicuously kicks him in the shin the tenth time, because no matter what the Blossoms are up to, * they * are here to support their child. He sends her an apologetic smile and focuses back on the stage in front of him, an arm slung over the back of the chair their elder daughter is occupying next to him. She can see he's still not solely focused on the play, but she ignores it this time. Clifford and Penelope Blossom are not really that interesting to her as they seem to be to Hal. 

~SAME FACES DIFFERENT PLACES~

The first time she talks to Penelope Blossom, is because their other children had bonded over their complete lack of interest in dancing. Alice picks her daughter up from practice, only just in passing acknowledging the other woman's presence as she helps her own daughter into her street shoes, and the blonde turns her head for only the briefest of seconds and then suddenly she's alone with Betty, her older daughter nowhere to be seen. She heaves a sigh of frustration because it's not the first time seven year old Polly decided to wander off on her own. She's a good kid, but this is just dangerous and it seems like she's not willing to learn not to do it. 

Betty pulls on her sleeve, indicating she's finished putting her dance outfit away, and hands the bag over to her mother eagerly. Alice takes it, her daughter's hand in her other one. Then she's off in search for Polly. Betty is cranky because practice had been tough and she's probably coming down with something, too and she just wants to go home and eat and sleep, and so Alice needs twice as much time to find her other child, though she's been looking in the same place for the third time now. She loves her daughters, cherishes every moment with them, but there are times she wishes she had that nanny her husband had insisted on hiring just after Polly's birth. It would be a lot simpler at times. 

Alice spots the girl by the front door, outside, legs dangling from the bench back and forth. She seems to be deep in conversation with a red headed boy Alice recognizes as the second Blossom twin. Great, just what she needs, her daughter making friends with the enemy. 

Okay, maybe * enemy * is a bit harsh, after all the boy is just six years old. Their respective fathers however are mortal enemies (again, maybe a bit much, but still the best way to describe it) and neither of them would be overly thrilled about that development. Alice couldn't care less. She bends down, tells Betty to please go back inside and look for that redhead and her mother – Alice learns her name is Cheryl – tell them the boy – Jason – is out here and come back out with them. Without wandering off like her sister. The girl promises and then hurries back inside the building while Alice approaches Polly and Jason. 

“How often...” She starts, 

“... did I tell you not to wander off like that?” and Penelope finishes from behind her, directing the question at her son. Both the children look sorry, but also not sorry enough to make it believable they won't do it again. 

“I'm sorry mom” It's almost creepy how in sync the two children are after a five minute conversation. 

Both Alice and Penelope decide not to chew out their kids in public, but usher a stern warning about 'talking about this at home'. Then Betty and Cheryl have joined their siblings on the bench, engaged so deep in conversation that it's hard to believe they've never even really met before. And so Alice Cooper and Penelope Blossom are reluctantly forced to make the barest of polite conversation, too. 

They start with introductions, unnecessary as it is, because even though they haven't met in person yet, both families are popular enough. They move on to superficial small talk, covering the weather to clothes to last week's dance recital. They're fast running out of topics to cover, when, finally, Betty and Cheryl alike start to fuss about going home and the two families part on friendly enough, if not slightly awkward terms. 

Alice decides not to mention the incident to her husband, since the only things she knows about the Blossoms come from Hal complaining and bad-mouthing the family. She knows they used to be friends – the two families – over a hundred years ago and she'd never cared enough to ask about the exact happenings, the Cooper's and the Blossom's are bitter rivals ever since – in business and apart from that. 

~SAME FACES DIFFERENT PLACES~

The first time she meets with Penelope Blossom, is a month after the awkward post-practice conversation. The last four weeks, the two women have been slowly getting acquainted while dropping off and picking up their children from dance rehearsal twice a week. On the third session they had let Jason and Polly play for a while until they'd both had to head to different appointments. They hadn't seen each other at pick up and it had given them something to talk about the week later. On the fifth session Cheryl and Betty, who had become quite inseparable, had begged them for after-practice pizza and ice-cream but there had been no time and so they had promised to do this some other time. Both families had seriously been busy that day, but it had mainly given them time to think about a way to get out of it. The two women might not actually hate each other and they don't really see the harm in their children being friends, but both their husbands would not be incredibly fond of the idea. By the sixth practice they had casually exchanged phone numbers. 

That's how the two women find themselves at a small cafe in town, amicably chatting over a cup of tea. It's neither forces nor awkward anymore and some time during their third refill Alice notices she's taken to staring at Penelope when the other woman's not looking. She shakes her head, clears her thoughts and decides to ignore the feeling she doesn't want to put a name to. 

Penelope Blossom is nice and polite and not nearly as stuck up as Alice thought her to be and definitively not as bad as her husband always makes her out to be. The woman might have only married into the Blossom family, but Hal seems to be certain she's almost as devious as Clifford, if not more so. 

But Alice doesn't see any of that and before the meeting is even over, they have agreed to make this a weekly thing. 

~SAME FACES DIFFERENT PLACES~

The first time she kisses Penelope Blossom is at the twins' birthday party two months later. All four of the children have struck up a remarkable friendship in the past months and as much as their fathers don't like it, then men are not to forbid them that. If it makes the kids happy, so be it and on occasions like this party, they'll always have their wives to take care of it. 

The women are in the kitchen since Alice volunteered to help preparing and bringing out the two cakes for the birthday kids. In no way could Alice explain what she'd been thinking in that moment, but she still knows that the moment her lips closed over the redhead's she hasn't been thinking at all anymore. It had been short and sweet and nothing more than a quick peck and Penelope hadn't reciprocate at all and Alice hadn't known why she did it in the first place. They hadn't talked about it. Hadn't even mentioned it. Had gone on like this never happened. Their children were still friends, they were still meeting once a week for tea and talk, they were still good. And it was fine like that. 

Now all Alice has to do is find a way to not let too obviously show she has actual feelings for the other woman. She's not prepared to name the feeling just yet, but she can't deny that she feels * something * - or that Penelope seemingly doesn't. 

~SAME FACES DIFFERENT PLACES~ 

The first time she sleeps with Penelope Blossom is six months after that awkward kiss, when she'd stumbled onto a rather tipsy redhead in a hotel bar. Alice had a huge fight with her husband and, she'd later found Penelope was in a similar situation. They'd gotten incredibly drunk together, Alice surprisingly resisted the constant urge to press her lips against the other woman's, and bad-mouthed their husbands. They'd ended up sharing a hotel room, sleeping off their drunkenness, curing their hangover with some eggs from the breakfast bar and then, since they somehow booked the room for two nights, headed back up to talk some more. 

Two hours later, she has the redhead pressed into the bed sheets, hips firmly holding her in place. Her tongue is eagerly exploring Penelope's mouth and by the sounds coming from the woman beneath her there's no mistaking that they're both very much enjoying this. Both of them are already dressed in next to nothing, the clothes strewn all around the bed. And Alice has no idea how they ended up here. 

The last thing she knows without a doubt is them talking, lounging comfortably next to each other on the bed. Then a hand accidentally brushing a thigh – she can't say who's hand or who's thigh – and then there might have been some heated looks and teasing touched involved, but neither of the women is exactly sure what happened. Their minds went blank when their lips finally touched. 

It's only awkward for a moment, after. They look at each other for a long time, not willing to break the connection just yet and then Penelope grabs Alice's hand, pulls her along into the bathroom and the shower and it feels like they've been doing this for ages already. They kiss behind the closed door of their hotel room before heading back home to their respective families. A day later, it's their weekly tea appointment and after a long debate with herself, Alice is brave enough to send the text to meet her in the hotel instead of the cafe as usual. 

It's becoming a regular occurrence after that. They'll meet in private and spend a few precious hours making love to each other. They are always careful, never arriving or leaving together, doing anything not to be placed into the same hotel room together by the staff. An affair is always a risky thing, but they come from two rivaling families with unpredictable husbands. Neither of the two women want to find out what'll happen if their relationship should be discovered. 

But it goes on for months without anyone ever be aware of it.

~SAME FACES DIFFERENT PLACES~

The first time she says I love you to Penelope Blossom is when they realize this has gone too far. The blonde says it while cuddled up in bed, the redhead says it back without hesitation. Then they get dressed, kiss each other once more and then go their separate ways.

The next time they see each other they're pretending nothing's wrong.

**Author's Note:**

> promts at: southside_queen@web.de


End file.
